


Talk and Devour

by JadedCoral



Category: Being Human, The Almighty Johnsons
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, End of the World
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-17
Updated: 2013-10-17
Packaged: 2017-12-29 16:52:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1007782
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JadedCoral/pseuds/JadedCoral
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The day he meets Mitchell, things have already gone to hell.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Talk and Devour

**Author's Note:**

> This. Is kinda confusing. I just wanted to write a short story where Anders and Mitchell were a bit insane with Anders controlling people with his speech and Mitchell drinking everyone in their way. Didn't quite go as I planned...

The day he meets Mitchell, things have already gone to hell.

They stand facing each other under a bridge that used to lead across the river before the bombs fell. Now it’s a pile of ruin and rubble, a place where no one would willingly walk to because sometimes the crunching beneath your feet ain’t just pieces of concrete and crushed glass, but human bones as well. Anders tries his hardest not to think about it.

Mitchell looks at him with hollow eyes. He’s pale and looks hungry and desperate for things which he cannot have lest he stands here today, under this once bridge with Anders mirroring him in more ways than either of them feel comfortable with.

The third man, Loki, which both Anders and Mitchell apparently have the misfortune to have met and known, looks at the two of them with a satisfied smirk, nodding as if to agree with himself.

The very sight of him makes Anders think that if he had ever had a choice, then he’s made the wrong one.

“Good, the two of you have met,” Loki’s voice fills the silence, his perfectly tailored suit a stark contrast to his surroundings and the smile on his face bordering on mad. “This is the last time you’ll be seeing _me_. Do as you’re told and get me what I want. That is all I ask of you. Is it not a fair deal?”

His laugh is the only one to echo on the concrete, because while Anders doesn’t know about Mitchell, this joke has a punch line which Loki has beaten into him so hard that he wishes it had left him bleeding on the ground unable to get up ever again.

“I’ll leave you to it.” are Loki’s parting words before he walks away whistling, kicking a skull with his leather shoes just because he finds it hilarious.

When they’re done seeing the back of their employer –“Master” Loki wanted to be called, but Anders refuses to degrade himself any more than he has to- Anders turns back to look at Mitchell, a small smirk playing on his lips because it’s the last pretence of self he has left.

Mitchell fails to respond in kind. He doesn’t turn a cold shoulder or look at him in annoyance, either. Instead he’s before Anders before he can blink, wrapping his arms around him and whispering into his ear, “Everything will be all right.”

The words dodge any false persona he has ever built for himself, they pierce through every selfish act and hurtful word that has ever defined him and crawl their way right into his being, tearing a raw sob from the depths of him. It’s so sudden and unexpected that the tears start to fall before Anders can do anything about it, and when he tries to push the other away harshly Mitchell just clings on tighter, holding on tight because when Mitchell makes Anders break, he’ll also keep him together.

And so Anders cries, because _shit_ , his life was crazy before all this, but now that the world has gone insane it’s hardly a life he wants to keep living. There’s nothing to hold onto, not anymore, save for Mitchell and so he holds onto him because Mitchell too refuses to let him go.

“It’ll be all right,” he keeps saying, either to Anders or to himself. “I’ve made deals with devils before. It’ll be all right.”

“Fine,” Anders agrees, laughs and swallows thickly because he likes Mitchell’s delusions. “I’m Anders, by the way. Anders Johnson.”

“John Mitchell,” the other introduces himself, resting his forehead on Anders’ instead of shaking his hand. It’s been such a long time since he’s shared closeness with anyone that Anders finds it a bit intimidating. That if he doesn’t fight it and Mitchell forces himself close and takes away his self-reliance, he’d stop being the coward who survived because it’d be the end of the world all over again for him.

A beeping sound coming from the pocket of Anders’ jacket interrupts their silence, and after clearing his throat, he says, “That’ll be our first objective.”

Mitchell nods, but that is all the movement he makes.

“I talk,” Anders says, quite unwilling to move himself. “What do you do?”

It’s a long silence that follows his question, and when Mitchell finally answers him, it’s with a small, barely-there whisper.

“I devour.”

 

* * *

 

“Stop.”

Anders is a full god now. And because he’s Bragi, God of Poetry, people _will_ listen to what he has to say, whether they want to or not. It’s all he thought he’d want. To be this powerful being that got people to bend to his will.

But that was a long time ago.

The man stops at his command. It doesn’t stop him from screaming, though, so he tells him to, “Shut up.”

He can hear Mitchell behind him, shifting and rustling until he’s standing beside Anders, covered in the red of his feast.

“Please, Anders,” Mitchell is pleading. “ _Please_ let him go.”

Mitchell touches his hand only to leave red markings on it. “Don’t do this to me,” he’s saying, “Baby, please.”

And what would be a whisky-breath of a vampire, he exhales against Anders’ ear, lips twisting when he says, “I do enjoy the chase.”

So Anders gives the man his will back, watching him hare off with Mitchell behind him. He can almost remember a time when walking on concrete and bones made him grimace, but that must’ve been long ago because today he’s standing in a pool of blood and gore and feels nothing but sorry when Mitchell stops his cat-like habits and finally sinks his teeth in too deep.

Yes, Anders has never felt as sorry for Mitchell as he does now.

 

* * *

 

Sometimes Mitchell tells him stories about a pink house and the people who lived in it. He always has a smile on his face as he does so, telling funny stories of tea and marigolds and a television older than him. He says they had house meetings and that once he invited the whole neighbourhood inside because those were the happiest days of his life, and maybe he had gotten a bit drunk on it.

Anders thinks of his life between now and then, thinks about telling Mitchell how he often returned to an empty apartment or how he fucked around or how he was fucked around with. He thinks about telling Mitchell of his three brothers and how they never quite go along but how they were really all that he ever had.

In the end he doesn’t say much at all, because Mitchell runs out of happy memories so fast, and that’s when he starts to cry and crawls his way onto Anders’ person to stay there sobbing. Because all he’s ever wanted was to be human, to _feel_ like one, weak and vulnerable and he’ll hold onto that image of them even though they now have the guns and the bombs and the madness to tear the world to pieces to rid it of the supernatural.

“I hate myself,” Mitchell is saying and sobbing, and Anders thinks that those might have been Ty’s last words as well, because while he doesn’t know where Mitchell gets the strength to forgive himself enough to continue on living, Ty could never do the same.

He could tell a story about a dark and frozen homeland he’s left behind, where his brother harvested the full potential of his powers without wanting to, making things go from bad to worse. Anders wants to play with the idea that Ty still lives, even if no one around him does, and does not listen when Mitchell tries to tell him the news about there being no people left in New Zealand.

He wonders if Mike would call him his brother still, even after all that he’s done, were their paths to cross again. He doubts that he would. Doesn’t even believe that he’ll ever see Mike again, not when he’d gone after Axl who’d gone mad with power, because he’s a full god now, and the humans are such fools to fight against him.

“I _despise_ myself.” Mitchell cries even when Anders runs his fingers through his hair to soothe him. He doesn’t try to tell Mitchell it’ll be all right. They’re both the cowards who survived, and if anything, all he can do is agree that maybe he really has a reason to.

Still, he holds on to Mitchell, because even though the world is not a kind place, they can be kind to each other all the way until their services to Loki are deemed satisfying enough to grant them their wish to just make it all stop.


End file.
